1903] Attwood Educational Value of Nature Study. 197 



Knowledg-e The acquisition of knowledge satisfies our curiosity 

 or mental appetite, the minJ is nourished, and intellectual growth 

 becomes possible. As a subject taught purely as tact-lore, science 

 ranks as high as any other, ^he fund of information which a 

 scientist possesses is of itself a source of great pleasure and profit 

 to the owner. A few years ago a person was not regarded as 

 educated who could not interpret the writings of the ancient 

 Greeks and Romans ; a few years hence a person will not be 

 regarded as educated who cannot interpret the "manuscripts of 

 God." the open book of Nature. Important as scientific know- 

 ledge is, its acquisition by the sudent of nature is merely incidental, 

 it is a by-product, a side-issue. We do not advocate a course in 

 Nature Study for the purpose of merely storing the mind with 

 useful information. 



b. From an educationist's standpoint, Skill or executive power 

 is an instrumei-.t for higher acquisitions. A large amount of 

 mechanical skill is developed in raising and training plants and 

 animals, in mounting botanical and entomological specimens, and 

 in manipulating apparatus employed in various experiments. 

 Moreover, Nature Study forms an excellent basis for much expres- 

 sive school work which is largely a matter ot skill : the oral and 

 written expression of facts observed and truths ascertained, the 

 drawing of the natural objects considered, and the general impulse 

 to tell what is seen, develop power in all forms ot expression. 



Though the constant manipulation of natural objects will 

 develop a high degree of practical efficiency, we do not advocate 

 that Nature Study should be taught merely with the object of 

 acquiring Skill. Why should we content ourselves with a high 

 ideal when there is a higher ? 



" We needs must love the highest when we see it." 



c. The subjects of Discipline or training are those whose aim is 

 to develop mental power, that is, power to think logically, to 

 reason consecutively, to generalize broadly. While scholarship, 

 capacity, is the aim of knowledge subjects, potentiality, capabil- 

 ity, is the aim of educational discipline. The mind is treated, not 

 as a tank to be filled, but as an organism to be quickened or as a 

 faculty to be developed. 



